Nestpionage! And Other Feathered Curiosities From HistoryA warbler helps solve a spy case, and a birdwatcher turns out to be a notorious murderer. Talkin' Birds host Ray Brown speaks about birds in history.

SIMON: Murder, espionage, intrigue, birds. Ray Brown, host of the radio show and podcast "Talkin' Birds," joins us now to talk about some curious tales of birds in history. Ray, welcome back.

RAY BROWN: Thank you.

SIMON: First off, there's a bird who played a role in a signature American event of the Cold War.

BROWN: Right, a bird that can claim connection to the U.S. House Un-American Activities Committee. It's the prothonotary warbler.

(SOUNDBITE OF PROTHONOTARY WARBLER CHIRPING)

BROWN: It relates to an incident in 1948 when a former avowed Communist named Whittaker Chambers testified before that committee that he and Alger Hiss had engaged in espionage against the United States. During the testimony, Chambers said that Hiss was a birdwatcher and had once bragged about seeing a prothonotary warbler near the Potomac River in D.C. And that testimony convinced many members that the two men knew each other as Chambers had claimed. Hiss denied. Well, Chambers escaped punishment as a cooperative witness, but Hiss the birdwatcher ultimately went to jail for perjury.

SIMON: I have to ask you about the role of a bird in a very famous murder case.

BROWN: That famous murder case was that of Leopold and Loeb in the early 1920s. Nathan Leopold had a hobby of ornithology and he was quite an expert - probably knew more about a rare bird or a pretty rare bird called the Kirtland's warbler than anyone else in the country.

(SOUNDBITE OF KIRTLAND'S WARBLER CHIRPING)

BROWN: Well, he made a trip to northern Michigan. And when he came back to his Chicago area, he developed a new interest along with a very close friend of his, Richard Loeb. And that was the interest in committing the perfect crime. Well, they kidnapped and then killed a young friend called Bobby Franks. And the crime was exposed when police found an usual pair of eyeglasses at the scene of the crime that turned out to belong to Leopold.

But he claimed that those glasses fell out of his pocket while he was doing some bird watching. But at the trial, he couldn't replicate those glasses falling out of his pocket. That was one of the things that led to his conviction, or both of them being convicted.

Loeb was killed in prison by a fellow inmate. Leopold was released 33 years later and again became a birdwatcher. It's pretty amazing, Scott. He moved to Puerto Rico, published "A Checklist Of The Birds Of Puerto Rico And The Virgin Islands." And by the way, that Kirtland's warbler? First bird ever to be listed under the Endangered Species Act as making something of a comeback - maybe kind ironic that it may owe its survival in part to the work of Nathan Leopold.

SIMON: Forgive me, but whenever I see a mystery birdwatchers with binoculars are always on the list of suspects.

BROWN: (Laughter) We had a Boston-area birder, Scott, a couple of years ago who was birding in the wintertime up in the North Shore just north of Boston, out on a marsh, looking for wintering ducks and such. The problem was that right across on the other side of the marsh were some private homes. Well, the folks over there, I guess they weren't birdwatchers. They saw this guy with binoculars and figured he was a peeping Tom.

Anyway, they call the police. The police came and suggested to the birdwatcher that hey, there are no birds around in the wintertime, so you must be a peeping Tom. They released him after further questioning. He didn't exactly make history, Scott, but he did get on the 11 o'clock news.

SIMON: Ray Brown, host of "Talkin' Birds" from the studios of WGBH in Boston. Thanks so much, Ray.

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